I’ve definitely had experiences I cannot explain, but that doesn’t really make me want to turn to belief. Currently, part of my father’s death-practice (which it is helping me to think of this as, since that is something I can relate to, on a Buddhist level) is getting the founder of KofC canonized. So suddenly, I’m part of a community sharing stories of miracles and hopes for miracles. One family friend actually said that she believes that God is holding off on curing my father so that when he does, it will be unmistakably a miracle. Now, I’ve grown up and become accustomed to a poker face when confronted by religious stupidity (I purposely read things like the New Oxford Review while hanging out with my parents), so I think I managed not to give away my incredulity. But what arrogance! Firstly, to think to know what reasons god, even if you do believe in the Divine, has for doing (or not doing) anything; but also to think that this was helpful?! In the face of death, I find that acceptance is healthier than denial. But who am I to dictate the paths another has to walk?

And I think this is the heart of John’s post & the community here: I, too, could use a reminder that I don’t have a “Red Phone” to Batman the Divine.

I’ve been going through a rethinking of spirituality lately. When friends and family members get me talking about past spiritual experiences that I’d had, they’re amazed that I could have experienced them and still not believe.

I like what you said that these feelings are what we want them to be. I feel the same feelings while hiking in the wilderness, playing with my daughter, and anticipating the birth of a child. While all of those could be attributed to god, I now feel that they are more about things that we love and are excited about. When I was excited about the BOM, I felt the same thing when I read it. Now, it just gives me a headache.

He also remarked in Mere Christianity the same thing – the gut “feeling” we get from intense sadness and intense joy is surprisingly the same.

When my faith bubble burst, I had to rethink my spiritual experiences. I had to think about why I had an experience that I thought was testifying to the truthfulness of the BoM. I had to think about experiences at the temple. When I thought about those things, I realized I also had similar sensations when getting spooked by a movie.

I had to think further about something that always troubled me – that being how do different people get different answers and messages from God. I ended up chalking all these things up to what we want them to be.

I don’t know that they mean anything more than that. I doubt that they do, but I don’t know that they don’t.

Being LDS took me in the direction of knowing I had a lot of autonomy in my life. I appreciate that after growing up thinking my sole purpose was to praise and worship God and that He controlled everything. I have taken the next steps in claiming more autonomy for myself. For me, a big part of that has been accepting that there are not answers for everything and to just be.

An attitude of humility seems best. Spiritual experiences are hard to describe and understand. While we “moderns” might want to quickly analyze it and write it off, we have to keep an open mind, both with ourselves and with others.

That’s why I come here – I’m trying to keep my mind open. God help me if it becomes closed.

Jonathan, I’m not writing off all attempts to capture and explain mystical experience. In many senses, I’m probably as modern as you are–I’m not a positivist, but I believe in an objective reality and that the scientific method is the best tool that we have for capturing and explaining it.

I think that my post has more to do with how we communicate spiritual experience in our interpersonal interactions. I want to be able to enjoy some of my experiences without the burden of explaining and analyzing and describing each one. And I want to give others the space to do the same. Does that make sense?

I think that I am right there with you on the ‘I just want to be’ thing, but I think it makes some people uncomfortable to not put things into words. I guess when these people try to check up on me spiritually I just want to say that I am good and that’s all, but I usually wind up trying to describe it a lot more, which just frustrates me because I don’t have words for it, and I don’t need to have words for it, but somehow I feel like I do for them.

Thanks for sharing this John.